Mitsuaki Kojima

　After a winter break spent composing New Year poetry, our haikuists turn their attentions back to work-related themes. Architects, ethnologists, carpenters, and policemen were busy this cold week, but J.D. Heskin in Minnesota notes he's been quite happy to stay at home.

First winter
of work retirement
warming up to it

　Keiko Fukunaga's daughter will turn 20 this year so she dressed up in a beautiful kimono with three thousand of her peers to spend the day at Kagoshima city hall.
　At the end of the day she telephoned her father to relay the news about the festivities. Coming-of-Age Day put John Cronin in a light-hearted mood this year. He was so delighted by colorful kimono in Chigasaki, Kanagawa, that he wrote a poem about them containing a gentle pun on words on the final line.

Dad gives up
watching soccer game
daughter's call

Seijinshiki
long-sleeved kimono
is maiden Japan

　To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake, Charlie Smith placed a ring of camellia flowers around a small stone lantern in the yard of his Raleigh, North Carolina, home. He lit candles and incense and then realizing that life goes on, wrote the following haiku.

Kobe quake
hits hard and swiftly
Ichiro

　In Osaka, Hidehito Yasui composed a more heart-wrenching haiku while thinking about the recent tsunami disaster. Lorne Henry composed hers while gardening in Warkworth, Australia, and Paul Sminkey was in Okinawa.

Mama! Mama!
children disappear
into the ocean

I garden
rescue helicopter
overhead

Helicopters
cross a harvest moon_
glaring in protest

　Winter ends next week according to the haiku calendar. The delightful poetic expressions ``haru chikashi,'' spring is near, and ``haru tonari,'' spring in the neighborhood can be used. Cats in love is also a popular, if peculiar haiku theme at this time of year.

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